Has anyone ever sued a GP for side effects of a medication?

[jemimavintage]

Hello lovely group - Very quickly...

I had painful periods. I was refused a stronger painkiller to help with them. I'm now 50. This all kicked off approx. 3 years ago. Before then NO HISTORY of painful periods (even tho they've been getting more and more painful since a c-section in 1995), no history of pain meds, no history of ANY type of illness... Normal weight, 8 stone.

GP gives me Cerelle... within a month I am very very poorly... within 3 months I've had an emergency admission into a hospital in USA and had 3 procedures: gallbladder removal (no stones, no sludge, only mega irritation, cholecystitis), sphinctertomoy (because the sphincter had closed shut and blown my common bile duct out to several size that it should be, right up into my liver actually!!, and some stenting of that duct to help keep it open. The cost was $76,000. Health insurance paid it.

I have zero doubt that the WHOLE ISSUE, was caused by Cerelle. 'Gallbladder' disease is listed as a side effect. It also did NOTHING to stop my period pain, in fact, it gave me cramps and bleeding every single day.

I feel pretty mad to have gone through all of that. I was so scared. 6 days in hospital feeling very very poorly. Some outpatient appointments, a private MRCP scan in Harley St when I got back for £3,000 of my own money because I was still in pain and was worried that the hospital in USA (small border town) had screwed up. Well they had. I HAD acute pancreatitis from the gallbladder/sphincter issue....and no-one there told me. That lead to me having pancreatitis for 12 months and not realising it. My UK GP - the same practice - dismissed the Harley St conclusion that I had acute pancreatitis and tried to not give me any pain relief, saying it wasn't possible that I had it because my GB had now come out.

The Cerelle had a 'side effects' sheet in the box. One never thinks that one will GET the side effects. And I actually believed....that the 'pill' would stop my periods and give me some much needed relief.

On to today, I have adenomyosis and possibly endometriosis.. This has nothing to do with why I'm interested in whether I can DO anything about having suffered those side effects as a result of taking Cerelle tho..

I mean, can we bring a case for side effects from a med that the GP probably thought would.........help the situation??!!? It was a direct bunch of CRAP I got from that medication..

thanks group,

Jem x

Hi 'upsideup' - yes, the lawyer in Guildford said that there absolutely could be a case. In a nutshell, the US docs performed a sphincterotomy with no prior consent or knowledge. His advice was that he would take on the case via my health insurance. In the UK, and in the US, it would normally be expected that consent would be given PRIOR to that procedure, because some people....don't want it.

thanks

Jem :)

Hi 'welshweasel' - you'll have to check your facts again. I'm in about 10 pancreatitis groups. You can ABSOLUTELY have acute pancreatitis for a year, and even for many years. It's a shocking factoid, but yes. You can. And that was a huge fear for me. I'm very lucky that I only had it for a year.

thanks

Jem :)

Hi Group - I'm glad that Mumsnet put a warning before anyone accepts 'medical advice' from here because the post from Welsh Weasel is absolutely 100% incorrect and inaccurate, and could easily mislead someone looking for answers. It IS however, a common misconception, so it's not a nefarious post that Welsh Weasel is making.

thanks

Jem :)

I am not a lawyer.
I am (have been) a Pharmaceutical Toxicologist.
I believe that you are mistaken in your assertion that your illness was caused by the Desogestrel.
Based on the timeline which you have provided, the increasing severity of your period pain is likely to be the start of your problems (endometriosis) which has impacted on your other peritoneal organs. I am very sorry that you have been so ill. I really don't think that you have a case for suing anyone: not the GP, not the manufacturer, not the MHRA or EMEA who will have registered the drug and approved the package inserts.
With hindsight (which is of course easy to say) if you were, as you say, very very ill after one month on desogestrel, it would have been better to go back to see a doctor rather than travelling to US for some months (a country where more people die from cross-reactions between medicines than from the original disease)..

As a solicitor I would say good luck to you finding one who will take this case on for you!

LavenderDoll

No you have no case

Thanks Lavender

This threads had me properly creased. OP if you're rich then please amuse yourself with a dead end court case. Also come and update us while it's on for the LOLs please.

informed consent. It’s your responsibility to know what you’re putting into your body.

Yeah ok....I’ll let the GMC know that I shouldn’t be practicing in this field any longer. You can have chronic pancreatitis but acute pancreatitis, by it’s very nature, is acute!! You can’t have it for a year. But what do I know....bloody medical schools these days...

Hi 'ShowmetheElf' - hey, it's not me who noted 'gallbladder disease' on the leaflet. It was pharma. So those complications absolutely came from that med. Endometriosis/adeno is not specifically associated with CBD/liver/pancreatitis.

thanks

Jem :)

Hi 'Jem'

You can ABSOLUTELY have acute pancreatitis for a year, and even for many years.

I think you may mean Chronic....lol

Thanks

Rainbow

(My actual name)

Hi 'welshweasel' - I advise you to go into a pancreatitis group and ask them. AP for a year, or years does not equal CP. But you can have CP, as a separate condition, sure. You can also have recurrent AP, of which, I have no history.

thanks

Jem :)

Jem, I can’t see gallbladder disease listed in the side effects for Cerelle. Care to share the link to that information?

Gallbladder disease is very common (particularly in middle aged women). Acute acalculous cholecystitis is pretty common. A tight sphincter (requiring sphincterotomy) is probably less common but will cause a dilated biliary tree, can cause pancreatitis and cholecystitis and if both of those are bad enough you can get deranged liver function. Pancreatitis is a well known complication of any intervention/instrumentation of the biliary tree and doesn't necessarily mean that anything's been done wrong.

I'm not a GP/gynaecologist, but it seems that the drug you were prescribed was indicated for the symptoms you presented with. You've said you don't have a history of GB disease & there was no reason to believe you were at any higher risk for developing GB side effects than anyone else the GP may have prescribed the same drug for.

The drug information sheet lists GB disease as a well know possibility (note it says GB disease not sphincter of Oddi disease - they're not necessarily the same thing). You seem to have read the list of SEs and decided that the balance of risk and benefit was still in favour of taking the drug. I'm not exactly sure what you think you can sue anyone for!

Hi 'rainbowdashflip' - AP and CP are technically and medically...different conditions, both treated in different ways, with different outcomes.

thanks

Jem :)

They note gallbladder disease as a contraindication not a side effect.
It's not mutual causation.
If you have gall bladder disease/cholestatic liver disease you shouldn't take the progesterone pill as it will not be metabolised properly. The POP does not cause liver disease/GBD.
Your lawyer is trying to make money out of you I'm afraid.

Hi 'walkingthroughawall' - yes, even if it had listed sphincter of oddi as a potential, I would not have taken the med.

thanks

Jem :)

Drs must love you.....

What exactly do you hope to gain from this?

hey, it's not me who noted 'gallbladder disease' on the leaflet. It was pharma. So those complications absolutely came from that med.

What evidence do you think you have that there was a causal relationship?

Jem. I treat patients with pancreatitis on a daily basis. I don’t need to go and ask on online groups. I am obviously fully aware of the fact that you can get recurrent episodes of acute pancreatitis and that some of those people go on to develop chronic pancreatitis. But an acute pancreatitis that lasts a year? Find me one case report and I’ll eat my hat.

Hi 'showmetheelf' - the GB issue/SoD issue/AP were all as a result of the Cerelle, given the statistical chances of those things spontaneously occurring for no other reason. Yes, anything is possible. But on balance.. So I think the manufacturer should list those issues as a potential. Heck, there's a LOT of money to be made from pharma NOT listing those potentials..

thanks

Jem :)

You still cannot prove the Cerelle directly caused you to develop gallbladder disease or pancreatitis, therefore there is no case to answer.

Head....brick wall....I’m out!

Hi 'welshweasel' - you should not be saying that AP can't last a year or years. It absolutely can. You need a fact check. AP is a bloody dangerous illness and can go on and on and leave a person in 24/7 agony.

thanks

Jem :)

I wouldn't have taken the med if it had stated 'potential to damage common bile duct, pancreas, and liver'. No

Prove it. Given that you talk about having been on multiple medications in the past and following the procedure, you're going to have a very hard time proving your assertion. Didn't you take oxycodone for a long time, the highly addictive opioid?